Luke was seized by Greek police after he took sweetheart Chelsea Hyndman, of Castleford West Yorkshire, to hospital in May 2010. They accused him of fatally beating the 20 year-old – but Luke, found guilty of causing death by grievous bodily harm – claims he did not lay a finger on her.

His family have spent £250,000 fighting to clear his name – and need a further £20,000 to appeal against Luke’s conviction at the Mixed Criminal Court of Heraklion on May 29.

“It’s on my mind – the trial, Chelsea – day and night. I have nightmares all the time and I don’t sleep properly,” said Luke.

“I’ve got no job, no money, nothing. It’s hard to take. I do think my conviction will make it harder for me to find work. It’s horrible – it’s draining.

“But not one friend has turned their back on me. All of my witnesses there knew Chelsea before they knew me, and they were hugging me as soon as they came out of court. Everyone has just been worrying about me.”

The couple had been together for two years when Chelsea died. Luke said that neither he nor Chelsea was overly concerned when she became ill. They mistakenly thought she had a bad case of sunstroke.

But she died a day later despite emergency surgery on her abdominal injuries.

“At the end of the day, I’m not a doctor and I wasn’t one of the judges – it’s not for me to say how she died,” said Luke. “The last thing that Chelsea said when she went into surgery was that she loved me and I said I loved her. That was the last time I saw her.

“When we were in hospital, it was nothing serious, we were thinking. This is why I’ve never understood how I lost her.

“She was walking, talking – just normal conversation. Within hours she had gone.”

Luke was accused of murdering Chelsea and spent five months on remand in jail in Greece, where he was verbally abused by other prisoners in his cramped cell, before being freed on bail in October 2010, on the condition he did not leave the country.

Luke’s bail was extended last October, allowing him to come back to Britain.

Luke’s father Patrick, also an electrician, re-mortgaged their house in Gayfield Avenue, to fund the costs of fighting the allegations against his son.

He suffered a heart attack in February 2011 which was blamed on the stress of the case.

In between applying for jobs, Luke said he was determined to continue to visit Chelsea’s grave – despite his conviction.

“It’s going to be more difficult going to the grave now, obviously, because of the verdict. I went a few times after coming back to Britain on bail.

“I’ve been up with my mum and dad. She was very close to my friends here and a lot of us went up to Castleford, and we all laid flowers. I always put my name on them. I’ll never stop going. No-one will ever stop me doing that.”